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Androgen Receptor Expression in Early Triple-Negative Breast Cancer: Clinical Significance and Prognostic Associations

Background: Triple-negative breast cancers (TNBC) are characterized by aggressive tumour biology resulting in a poor prognosis. Androgen receptor (AR) is one of newly emerging biomarker in TNBC. In recent years, ARs have been demonstrated to play an important role in the genesis and in the developme...

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Autores principales: Pistelli, Mirco, Caramanti, Miriam, Biscotti, Tommasina, Santinelli, Alfredo, Pagliacci, Alessandra, De Lisa, Mariagrazia, Ballatore, Zelmira, Ridolfi, Francesca, Maccaroni, Elena, Bracci, Raffaella, Berardi, Rossana, Battelli, Nicola, Cascinu, Stefano
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2014
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4190544/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24978437
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/cancers6031351
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author Pistelli, Mirco
Caramanti, Miriam
Biscotti, Tommasina
Santinelli, Alfredo
Pagliacci, Alessandra
De Lisa, Mariagrazia
Ballatore, Zelmira
Ridolfi, Francesca
Maccaroni, Elena
Bracci, Raffaella
Berardi, Rossana
Battelli, Nicola
Cascinu, Stefano
author_facet Pistelli, Mirco
Caramanti, Miriam
Biscotti, Tommasina
Santinelli, Alfredo
Pagliacci, Alessandra
De Lisa, Mariagrazia
Ballatore, Zelmira
Ridolfi, Francesca
Maccaroni, Elena
Bracci, Raffaella
Berardi, Rossana
Battelli, Nicola
Cascinu, Stefano
author_sort Pistelli, Mirco
collection PubMed
description Background: Triple-negative breast cancers (TNBC) are characterized by aggressive tumour biology resulting in a poor prognosis. Androgen receptor (AR) is one of newly emerging biomarker in TNBC. In recent years, ARs have been demonstrated to play an important role in the genesis and in the development of breast cancer, although their prognostic role is still debated. In the present study, we explored the correlation of AR expression with clinical, pathological and molecular features and its impact on prognosis in early TNBC. Patients and Methods: ARs were considered positive in case of tumors with >10% nuclear-stained. Survival distribution was estimated by the Kaplan Meier method. The univariate and multivariate analyses were performed. The difference among variables were calculated by chi-square test. Results: 81 TNBC patients diagnosed between January 2006 and December 2011 were included in the analysis. Slides were stained immunohistochemically for estrogen and progesterone receptors, HER-2, Ki-67, ALDH1, e-cadherin and AR. Of the 81 TNBC samples, 18.8% showed positive immunostaining for AR, 23.5% and 44.4% of patients were negative for e-cadherin and ALDH1, respectively. Positive AR immunostaining was inversely correlated with a higher Ki-67 (p < 0.0001) and a lympho-vascular invasion (p = 0.01), but no other variables. Univariate survival analysis revealed that AR expression was not associated with disease-free survival (p = 0.72) or overall survival (p = 0.93). Conclusions: The expression of AR is associated with some biological features of TNBC, such as Ki-67 and lympho-vascular invasion; nevertheless the prognostic significance of AR was not documented in our analysis. However, since ARs are expressed in a significant number of TNBC, prospective studies in order to determine the biological mechanisms and their potential role as novel treatment target.
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spelling pubmed-41905442014-10-09 Androgen Receptor Expression in Early Triple-Negative Breast Cancer: Clinical Significance and Prognostic Associations Pistelli, Mirco Caramanti, Miriam Biscotti, Tommasina Santinelli, Alfredo Pagliacci, Alessandra De Lisa, Mariagrazia Ballatore, Zelmira Ridolfi, Francesca Maccaroni, Elena Bracci, Raffaella Berardi, Rossana Battelli, Nicola Cascinu, Stefano Cancers (Basel) Article Background: Triple-negative breast cancers (TNBC) are characterized by aggressive tumour biology resulting in a poor prognosis. Androgen receptor (AR) is one of newly emerging biomarker in TNBC. In recent years, ARs have been demonstrated to play an important role in the genesis and in the development of breast cancer, although their prognostic role is still debated. In the present study, we explored the correlation of AR expression with clinical, pathological and molecular features and its impact on prognosis in early TNBC. Patients and Methods: ARs were considered positive in case of tumors with >10% nuclear-stained. Survival distribution was estimated by the Kaplan Meier method. The univariate and multivariate analyses were performed. The difference among variables were calculated by chi-square test. Results: 81 TNBC patients diagnosed between January 2006 and December 2011 were included in the analysis. Slides were stained immunohistochemically for estrogen and progesterone receptors, HER-2, Ki-67, ALDH1, e-cadherin and AR. Of the 81 TNBC samples, 18.8% showed positive immunostaining for AR, 23.5% and 44.4% of patients were negative for e-cadherin and ALDH1, respectively. Positive AR immunostaining was inversely correlated with a higher Ki-67 (p < 0.0001) and a lympho-vascular invasion (p = 0.01), but no other variables. Univariate survival analysis revealed that AR expression was not associated with disease-free survival (p = 0.72) or overall survival (p = 0.93). Conclusions: The expression of AR is associated with some biological features of TNBC, such as Ki-67 and lympho-vascular invasion; nevertheless the prognostic significance of AR was not documented in our analysis. However, since ARs are expressed in a significant number of TNBC, prospective studies in order to determine the biological mechanisms and their potential role as novel treatment target. MDPI 2014-06-27 /pmc/articles/PMC4190544/ /pubmed/24978437 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/cancers6031351 Text en © 2014 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Pistelli, Mirco
Caramanti, Miriam
Biscotti, Tommasina
Santinelli, Alfredo
Pagliacci, Alessandra
De Lisa, Mariagrazia
Ballatore, Zelmira
Ridolfi, Francesca
Maccaroni, Elena
Bracci, Raffaella
Berardi, Rossana
Battelli, Nicola
Cascinu, Stefano
Androgen Receptor Expression in Early Triple-Negative Breast Cancer: Clinical Significance and Prognostic Associations
title Androgen Receptor Expression in Early Triple-Negative Breast Cancer: Clinical Significance and Prognostic Associations
title_full Androgen Receptor Expression in Early Triple-Negative Breast Cancer: Clinical Significance and Prognostic Associations
title_fullStr Androgen Receptor Expression in Early Triple-Negative Breast Cancer: Clinical Significance and Prognostic Associations
title_full_unstemmed Androgen Receptor Expression in Early Triple-Negative Breast Cancer: Clinical Significance and Prognostic Associations
title_short Androgen Receptor Expression in Early Triple-Negative Breast Cancer: Clinical Significance and Prognostic Associations
title_sort androgen receptor expression in early triple-negative breast cancer: clinical significance and prognostic associations
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4190544/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24978437
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/cancers6031351
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